* If you watched the Boise-Nevada game last weekend and saw the Bronco kicker Kyle Brotzman miss the two chip shot FGs at the end that cost his team a shot at the Rose Bowl (or more), you couldn't help but feel for him. Thankfully, Dr. Saturday explains that those who still understand college football is just a game are coming to his defense after he was crucified in some quarters.

Did the Michigan fans reading this today notice anything during the "player insertion" portion of the Snackadium construction? As the defensive player finger foods are being placed on the guacamole field across from the O, someone asks "What kind of defense are we running? A 4-3 or a 3-4?"

*Sigh*

How sad that the dude planting snack food in a vat o' guac has a better grasp of defense than our defensive coordinator.

ED. NOTE: To MZone reader-slash-Snackadium engineer Wayne who sent that link, if we ever have an MZone reader tailgate outside the Big House, you're catering!

8 comments:

has Lynn Henning written anything in the last decade worth reading? actually, i thought he was dead (nothing personal- he's just older than dirt).

far too much is made of "saving the recruiting class", and the other "timing" issues he (and others) cite. the single, only, important consideration is getting the coaching decision correct.

after the 2000 season, Cooper took tosu to the Outback, got pantsed by the Cocks, and was fired when he got home. Geiger took a few weeks to find a new coach (some obscure, dorky dressing guy from a I-AA school i believe), and the bucks finished late in recruiting.

as much as this example pains me, i think it's fair to say that tosu somehow over came its lackluster 2001 recruiting class and managed to rebound tolerably well over the next few (10?) years.

point being, being sure of your decision on the coach is what counts. the rest is "details".

In theory I agree with you. If RR gets canned after the bowl game, I fully expect there to be significant transfer/decommit activity. That is a temporary consequence to fixing a longer term problem.

Many former elite football programs have fired coaches and came back to life quickly: Mack Brown at Texas, Bob Stoops at Oklahoma, Bo Pelini at Nebraska, Urban Meyer at Florida, Nick Saban at Alabama just to name a few.

The big difference and general fear for Michigan fans is the "cubbard" of talent that will be left. Cooper & Zook left Tressel and Meyer an incredbile number of talented players, which they turned around with disciple and good coaching to win a national title.

If/when RR leaves the building, the new coach will initially have to find a way to succeed with ninja fast/tiny smurfs. A good leader will alter their tactics to fit the intended strategy. Good coaches should alter their systems to match the talent (or lack of) to achieve wins.

When RR gets canned after the bowl game it will not matter if any recruits change their minds because the new coach may not want the smurfs anyway. I just hope that Brandon already has a plan in place and is just waiting to execute it after the bowl games.

It will matter to those recruits that were intending to enroll early. If I was a "current RR commit" seeking to get an early start in Ann Arbor -- I will certainly be better served to wait until a decision has been made.

I am sure either way Brandon has a plan in mind. I have to applaud his "fair approach" to this. To him this is a bigger issue than one coach for one sport. He said he was going to evaluate after the season is done -- and he is sticking to his guns.

I have to disagree 100% with Lynn Henning and think he even makes the argument counter to his case by citing Michigan State and John L. Smith. That hiring was a fiasco because Michigan State couldn’t even wait for him to finish the bowl game with his team. Is it too much to ask that you NOT call a coach's cell phone while he's coaching a game?

I know it feels difficult to wait but it’s just the right thing to do and I feel that doing the right thing pays dividends (yeah, I know it sounds naïve). If—for example—Michigan wished to hire Jim Harbaugh Michigan should let him finish his season with his current team, he deserves it, his team deserves it, his school and its fans deserve it. Again, it’s the right thing to do. To do otherwise, is arrogant and disrespectful to other schools.

Michigan did not do that when hiring Rich Rodriguez and we all see how that’s turning out. Based on the reasons Henning—and others—provide, the extra months of Rich Rodriguez recruiting provided by poaching him early from his alma mater should be paying dividends with a corps of talented juniors custom made for a Rich Rodriguez team. Instead, Rodriguez devotees continue to cite the team’s youth as a reason the lack of success, especially on defense.

As has been cited with Jim Tressel’s hiring, history provides us with several recent examples that show that it’s best to do things the right way and be patient and that acting in haste--and with a selfish sense of entitlement--to get the jump on the next recruiting class will end badly.

Extra months? UM hired RR in December. Signing day is the first week of February. Odoms is a very fine jr WR. So is RS sophomore Tree and jr Stonum. Jr Mike Martin does not suck in any way, shape or form. If Shaw wasn't made of glass I think he could qualify as a good player as well. I think Tree and Barnum were players that RR "brought" with him. The rest of his time was spent trying to convince Carr's recruits to stay. It's not like the guy had "months" to evaluate Carr's offers or woo some of his own WVU recruits to a campus, school, and program they'd never visited.

That's exactly my point, the extra recruiting time was inconsiquential and nothing was gained by hiring Rodriguez before he took West Virginia to their bowl game and finished their season. Other than the understandable wrath of fanbase that felt betrayed and then lawsuits and then more anger, etc, etc.

That and maybe some bad karma that may explain Rodriguez's inexplicible streak of bad luck since his arrival at Michigan (if one were inclined to believe in such things).

Ah! I see what you're driving at. Not a real big karma guy myself so I don't usually make a conclusion in that way.

I hope no one is holding that against RR, though. It's not his fault UM came callin' before the bowl game. What's he supposed to do, tell them "hang on, I promise I'll come after the bowl game"? That would leak and it'd be just as much of a nightmare.

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